Scottsdale Breakfast Club

An Affiliate of the Arizona Pilots Assn

 

 

 


The Knife & Fork

 

 

 


Breakfast Club Makes Annual Trek to Lake Havasu

Dines at The Makai Café

 

 

12 Oct 2014

By Warren McIlvoy

 

 

Our October Breakfast Club event saw us heading west in what has become an annual ritual migration to Lake Havasu, Arizona.  This flight is just slightly over an hour depending on aircraft speed and it does offer a modicum of desert and mountain scenery.

 

Our direct line route will take us over Wickenburg, Arizona and then over a series of colorful mountain ridges with the whimsical names such as: The Harcuvar Mountains, and the Buckskin Mountains with some rather broad valleys between them.  Alamo Lake is one of the more notable landmarks along the way with Crossman Peak that is just to the east of Lake Havasu. 

 

Along the way we kept in touch with other Breakfast Club members via our “group flight following” frequency.  As I made the turn around the south end of Crossman Peak, I could hear the chatter of aircraft in the pattern and since the winds were calm, everyone was using runway 32.  If the pattern is congested, it is a good practice to overfly the airport at 500’ above pattern and continue to the northwest and then make a descending turn onto the 45 to the left downwind for runway 32.  Today, there was a pretty good break in the traffic that allowed me to overfly the departure end of 32 and turn to the downwind.

 

We have always used Desert Skies for our meeting point as they let us use there two vans to get us into town.  It is about a 7-mile drive to the Makai Café and the London Bridge and with 26 people in tow, it took two trips to get everyone to our destination.  I had made reservations for our group and had requested that we get to use the outside patio dinning area but that wasn’t to be.  I always preferred the patio as it overlooks the lake channel and boat marinas along with the adjoining London Bridge.  Although we did have to sit inside, we were able to all sit in the same area. 

 

After a good breakfast and swapping flying stories with some to the other Breakfast Club folks, I took the opportunity to get some photos of what make this location so famous.  There are few destinations that offer “Kodak” moments that Lake Havasu does.  The Makai Café is on the lower level of a “shopping mall” that caters to the tourist.  The adjoining river channel is lined with boat docks and small beaches.  As you might recall from my story of last year, the London Bridge was constructed on dry land and once completed, the channel was dug under the bridge.  The large finger of land that we were now on, became an island.  The original Lake Havasu Airport was located on this island but the land became to valuable to host this noisy neighbor and a new airport was constructed to the north. Upon departure from the airport, if you overfly the lake, you can still see the remains of the old runway.   During spring break, this area is saturated with collage kids looking for that perfect tan to show-off when they return to their “rust belt” homes.  The “eye candy” here at that time would invoke memories of our own younger days.

 

By now it was time to get everyone back to the airport the same way that we got here; two trips for the van drivers thus ending yet another fabulous day of eating and flying.

 

The Lake Havasu Gang

 

  • Warren & Jeri-Ann McIlvoy with Imran Jamali in 93MB, BC-1 & 1.5
  • Paul Fortune and Richard Azimov in 31870, BC-2 and 201
  • John & Pat Rynearson in 3501S, BC-117
  • Glen Yoder and ? Santos in 31TC, BC-007
  • Jim Palmer, Jeff Jacobes, and Ronnie Lea in 9313H,
  • Richard Spiegel, Sam and Tami Foote,  and Debi LaRosa in 901KA, BC-3
  • Austin Erwin, Rich Kupiec, and Ron Greenbank in 6693M, BC-86, BC-47
  • Greg Coomans and Jon Slaughter in 4280W, BC-48
  • Chuck Waldrop and Grace Parsons in 5409D
  • Adam Rosenberg, Swathi Seethepally, and Divakar Chittury in 8377W, BC-72
  • Scott & Judy McNeil in 9736Y
  • Roger Whittier and ?

 

What’s Next?

 

Our November event will see us finally returning to White River, Arizona and the White Mountain Apache Motel.  In December, we will be traveling north (in the winter?) to Mesquite, NV and the Wolf Creek Golf Resort.  That’s all for now but remember, fly safe.

 

To view photos of this Breakfast Club event, just click on Lake Havasu